Estonia’s Skywalk Trading OÜ has asked Chairman of the Verkhovna Rada committee for energy and utilities Andriy Gerus and Head of the State Customs Service of Ukraine Maksym Nefyodov to interfere in the situation with locking a batch of diesel fuel made by Εlefsina refinery belonged to Hellenic Petroleum (Greece) at the Pivdenny seaport (earlier Yuzhny, Odesa region).
According to the text of Skywalk Trading’s letters to Gerus and Nefyodov, on August 25, 27,000 tonnes of diesel fuel was delivered to the seaport, which, after passing through all customs procedures, was shipped to port tanks in the customs warehouse mode. Later, on September 11, the State Customs Service of the State Fiscal Service (SFS) suspended the registering of fuel for analysis of sulfur content in it. On September 13, the company was refused to clear the batch due to exceeding the sulfur content requirement by 0.00001 percentage points.
So, according to the conclusion of the analysis of samples performed by the department of tax and customs examinations of the SFS, the sulfur content was 10.1 ppm (with a limit value of 10 ppm). This contradicts the quality certificate of the manufacturing refinery and the conclusions of international survey companies – Intertek, SGS and Saybolt. In accordance with their data obtained in the analysis of fuel during its discharge into tanks at the Pivdenny port, the sulfur content in the fuel varies between 9.4–9.6 ppm.
Despite the fact that the results of the analyzes of the SFS department contradict the manufacturer’s quality certificate and the conclusions of three international survey companies, and the recorded excess of the sulfur content is within the technical error of the device, the Energy Customs refused to re-analyze it and actually blocked 27,000 tonnes of fuel in reservoirs of the port,” the company said in the text of letters.
Skywalk Trading OÜ asked the officials, within their powers, to help resolve this situation, namely, to conduct a new sampling and research of diesel fuel from the Εlefsina refinery in any other state-owned laboratory with the involvement of international survey companies and any independent observers to ensure transparency and publicity of this process.
Deposit Guarantee Fund will hold a repeated auction on September 24 to sell liabilities on credit agreements of Delta Bank on the Debt Exchange, Inc. (DebtX, Delaware) increasing the starting price up to UAH 4.98 billion (5.7 times).
Oil and fat complex in Illichivsk and infrastructure in the Chornomorsk seaport are the parts of poll of assets of Delta bank, the fund reported on its website.
“The bids will run under the Dutch scheme [on lowering price],” the Deposit Fund said.
The asset pool includes legal claims (15 items), property rights under credit agreements (seven items) and receivables.
On July 9, the executive directorate of the Deposit Guarantee Fund annulled the results of an open auction to sell liabilities on credit agreements of Delta Bank with the book value of UAH 4.85 billion ($182 million) on the Debt Exchange, Inc. (DebtX, Delaware) for UAH 182.5 million with the starting price of UAH 868.8 million, taking into account decision of the National Bank of Ukraine (NBU) made on July 8, which annulled the results of the auction.
The NBU on July 8 revoked its decision made on April 9, 2019 approving the sale of the oil and fat complex in Illichivsk and infrastructure in the Chornomorsk seaport used as collateral for credits issued by Delta Bank over possible abuse by the buyer – Sky financial company, the beneficiary of which is the co-owner of Kernel Andriy Verevsky.
The price of the same assets at a similar auction held March 6 of this year amounted to UAH 906.2 million with the same buyer, but the district administrative court locked the deal under the suit of a company, which did not participate in the bidding.
According to the NBU, the auction was held with the presence of circumstances and possible manipulations on the part of the buyer, which could affect the outcome of the auction and the sale of the property at a lower price. According to the NBU, for three months the assets could not depreciate several times.
Mykolaiv seaport in January-August 2019 increased cargo handling by 23.78% year-over-year, to 21.263 million tonnes.
According to the Ukrainian Sea Port Authority, over the period port boosted transshipment of exported cargo by 33.1%, to 16.551 million tonnes, and imported cargo – by 5.62%, to 4.055 million tonnes, while coastal cargo handing fell by 2.6%, to 657,200 tonnes. The port did not transship transit cargo in January-August 2019.
Handling of liquid cargo in the Mykolaiv port decreased 5.04%, to 1.755 million tonnes, dry bulk cargo increased 27.88%, to 17.157 million tonnes, packaged – by 22.86%, to 2.351 million tonnes.
As reported, Mykolaiv seaport in 2018 increased cargo handling by 24.09% compared with 2017, to 29.2 million tonnes.
Mykolaiv seaport has an area of 97.3 ha and a water area of 224.5 ha. It is connected to the Black Sea by the Buzko-Dniprovsko-Lymansky canal. The port has 15 berths with a total length of 2.962 km.
Ascet Shipping, a private port operator, in August 2019 increased grain transshipment in Berdiansk seaport to 204,100 tonnes, which is 90.3% more than in August 2018 (107,200 tonnes).
According to the company’s press service, with reference to the director of Ascet Shipping’s branch in Berdiansk, Viktoria Abreyeva, in August the stevedoring company simultaneously loaded four to five motor ships per day at Berdiansk seaport. According to her, the corresponding volume of transshipment was achieved thanks to the planning and distribution of resources.
“We tried to load the vessels as quickly as possible, because the queue at the port’s roads always had four to seven ships waiting to be docked … Our process of loading ships using the direct “vehicle-to-ship” option allows loading several ships at different berths at the same time,” she said.
In August 2019 the company handled barley, peas and wheat, while loading 28 ships.
Ascet Shipping operates in five ports (Mykolaiv, Mariupol, Odesa, Kherson, Berdiansk). In Berdiansk seaport, it carries out a full cycle of sea transshipment of goods.
Odesa maritime merchandise port in January-July 2019 handled 13.937 million tonnes of cargo, which is 14.12% more than a year ago.
According to the Ukrainian Sea Ports Authority, over the period the port increased handling of exported cargo by 15.08%, to 10.316 million tonnes and imported cargo – by 13%, to 2.75 million tonnes, and coastal cargo three times, to 111,390 tonnes. Transit cargo transshipment fell by 2.5%, to 759,910 tonnes.
Handling of liquid cargo at the Odesa seaport over the period totaled 360,417 TEU (a rise of 9.29% year-over-year).
Odesa port is located on an area of 109.5 hectares.
The port accepts vessels with lengths of up to 270 meters and maximum draughts of 13 meters. The total length of the port’s berths exceeds 8 kilometers.
The Odesa seaport handled 12.084 million tonnes of freight in January-June 2019, which was 12.3% up year-over-year. During this period the port increased the handling of freight for export by 14.6%, to 9.089 million tonnes, for import by 6.6%, to 2.253 million tonnes, the Ukrainian Sea Ports Authority said. The transshipment of coastal freight tripled, to 85,690 tonnes At the same time, transshipment of transit freight decreased by 4.5%, to 655,430 tonnes.
In January-June 2019, the handling of bulk cargo at the Odesa seaport grew by 4.1%, to 799,380 tonnes, dry cargo by 20.5%, to 4.998 million tonnes, packaged cargo by 7.6%, to 6.286 million tonnes.
Container handling at the Odesa seaport in January-June 2019 totaled to 302,304 TEU (an increase by 6.4%).
